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[intheruins]

The first couple of days, there's not much Serena can do. She's lost a lot of blood and there's a lot more to healing from a caesarean than there is a natural delivery, too. 

It's almost maddening. She can't even nurse her son. Every so often they wheel her into a room with strange machines and let her hold him. He's doing well, she's told again and again, and she tells them that he's a survivor. That it's in his blood. 

The nurses don't know what to do with her stoicism and it's only at night when they're off doing whatever it is they do when she's supposed to be sleeping that she lets herself cry, careful and silent. She doesn't know how to live without Pemberton. She doesn't know how to be a mother without a father. 

If she were a better person, she'd think of Rachel with sympathy but instead, she just feels scorn. 

At least she'd had the Widow Jenkins. 

Serena and her child have no one.

After her blood levels lift back to normal, the doctors encourage her to move around. She's never been one to stay in bed all day and so she does, as much as it hurts. Since they took the IVs out, she hasn't been taking much for pain. They don't stick around to see if she swallows the pills and why should they? 

She wanders about the maternity ward in a robe that's too big and slippers that are cheap and flimsy, watching as happy mothers are pushed around in wheelchairs, carrying their babies. They smile at her and she forces a smile back but the jealousy still bites. If she were back in North Carolina, if she had any control at all, no one would stand between her and her son.

Serena doesn't ask permission when she heads to another floor. There's the promise of a cafeteria and she hopes it has more to offer than the tasteless mush that is brought to her bedside. She's reading a map and turning to follow it when she suddenly feels weak, reaching out for a wall before she has a chance to fall.

[Dated May 11th.]

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[cpthawk]

It's a relatively quiet day at the hospital, which Hawkeye is both grateful for and bored by. Between the hospital and the classes at night at Barton Medical, he's beginning to remember what it's like to be tired all the time. The first few weeks in Darrow had been like a holiday, sleeping in till late morning, no choppers, no announcements, no wounded. No responsibilities. Darrow General is nothing like the 4077th had been, so he has that perspective, at least. Nothing is ever going to be as bone-draining exhausting as the war had been, but he is starting to mainline coffee.

In Korea it had been gin. He'd always made sure he was fit to be in surgery (with one, awful exception), but here things aren't quite the same. He still needs something to get him through the long days and long nights, so coffee it is.

He has a paper cup of it in his hand as he walks down the hall, on his way to try and find a sandwich at one of the vending machines. They have him back in residency, which is a blow to his ego, but necessary. He's sixty-five years behind and his ego can be as large as it likes, he still has enough presence of mind to know he's not able to just walk back into being Chief of Surgery. Necessary, but teeth-grinding all the same.

He sees a woman reach for a wall and Hawkeye puts the coffee on a table nearby and goes to her side immediately, a supporting hand on her shoulder. As soon as he's close enough he sees Aurora's face and he frowns. "Aurora?" He hadn't even known she was in hospital. He saw her not long ago and she'd been just fine, but he knows that's not necessarily any kind of indication.

[intheruins]

Serena's used to being prodded and poked by men and women in white coats at this point – it's still surreal to her, the idea of a woman becoming a doctor – but she's not expecting it when a hand rests on her shoulder. She does her best to shake it off but she's weak, iron and no doubt blood sugar low with her attitude about the food.

"You've been mistaken," she says, and her tone doesn't soften when she turns to realize it's a doctor with a hand on her.

[cpthawk]

She shrugs him off and Hawkeye backs away a little, giving her space. It's clear enough from the way she reacts to him that this isn't Aurora, even if the resemblance is more than striking. She doesn't look like she should be out of bed, and Hawkeye glances down to her hospital wristband, checking for her ward number.

"So have you, looks like," he muses. She's supposed to be in the maternity ward, so there's no reason for her to be up here except perhaps boredom. Hawkeye knows better than anyone how time can stretch in this place, but she looks like a soft breeze would blow her over right now.

"I think we should get you back to bed." He doesn't move to touch her again, expecting that she'll shove him off again, but he does stand close by in case she falls.

[intheruins]

"I'm not going back to that ward until I've eaten something that doesn't seem like it's been pre-digested," Serena says pointedly, gesturing toward the cafeteria. She knows it's important to keep up her strength for her son, but that's easier said than done.

And were she to be perfectly honest with this perfect stranger, she'd tell him that she doesn't want to go back to a place filled with the sound of children crying when she needs special permission just to visit her own. It's unnatural. This whole place is.

She has family again for the first time in her life – her blood, her heir – and once more she's had to trek through hell to get there.

[cpthawk]

He laughs at that, nodding in agreement. Hospital food is about as good as army food, and he's glad at least that he's not the one who has to eat it. The sandwiches in the vending machine leave a lot to be desired, but at least they're not just questionable mush.

A quick glance at the clock on the wall tells him he has a bit more time to spare, and he should probably make sure she makes it to the cafeteria and back again. Maybe it's because of the face she shares, but he's more inclined to tell himself it's his duty of care as a doctor.

"I can't promise the cafeteria is much better," he admits, but he does change direction. "I was heading there myself," he says, and maybe it's half a lie but it doesn't hurt anybody. "I'd ask if you mind the company, but well, doctor's orders."

He gives her a wry smile. If she definitely wants him to leave he will, but not before asking a nurse to keep an eye on her.

[intheruins]

Serena bites back a remark about doctor's orders not meaning an awful lot to her, although it's spite for the doctor back at the timber camp she has more than any in Darrow. If he'd known what he was doing, maybe all of this could have been avoided.

"If that's what it'll take to get something I can eat," she says, not returning the smile although she's conscious of the fact he's doing her a favor. A quick press of a button could have an orderly at her side in no time, taking her back to the place where she can hear every baby cry but her own. "You're more than welcome to join me."

[cpthawk]

She doesn't look all that much like she wants to agree, but she also seems to realise that he has the ability to steer her straight back into bed if he wanted to. He's not above using that to his advantage, so he keeps smiling even if she doesn't return it, leading her to the cafeteria.

"It'll take that and a small bribe," he jokes, pushing his hands into his coat pockets. "A hundred dollars in small bills, unmarked and left near reception." A hundred dollars isn't all that much money these days, he knows. Same as how a cup of coffee is suddenly practically worth its weight in gold, apparently. He's still getting used to the inflation, still having to refrain from shouting objection whenever the girl at the coffee shop he likes hands him his bill.

The cafeteria is relatively quiet once they arrive, just a few visitors picking listlessly at terrible hospital food. Eating it nearly always makes him think of Igor, of having some indistinguishable mush slopped onto his plate in the mess tent. He avoids it wherever possible, but he's not about to leave her on her own, either.

It's a fifty-fifty toss up whether she's better off with the low blood sugar or risking the questionable chicken and rice on offer. "This way to your table, madame," he says as they enter, cocking his arm as though he's holding a napkin and gesturing the way to a table with the other. "May I suggest the bouillabaisse? Perhaps a glass of Dom Pérignon?" He slicks on an over the top French accent as he guides her to a seat.

[intheruins]

Serena could offer the man a bribe if she wanted to, although the envelope that contains the cash courtesy of the city remains in the top drawer of the bedside table in her room a few floors up. At the comment, she simply raises her eyebrow, following him into the cafeteria which is quieter than she's expecting.

There are so many people here. She's not used to such crowds. Even when she went to Boston for equestrian events, it was nothing like this. For a city cut off from the rest of the world, there are certainly an awful lot of them.

"Non, merci," she answers, though there's little humor in her tone. If his intention is to flirt with her then he's chosen a strange audience. It'll be months before she even considers letting another man look at her. She sits, wincing a little with the pain of it. There's a scar on her abdomen that she's sure is neater than anything she'd have gotten in 1929 but it aches all the same. "Though I'd take the wine if they'd let me."

[cpthawk]

Hawkeye flirts almost the way he breathes, often unconsciously. For the most part he doesn't mean anything by it, especially now. She's a patient and for all that he ignores authority most of the time, he does know where to draw the line. He'll make sure she eats something, gets back to her room okay, and then he'll leave her in peace.

He is, however, determined to at least crack a smile out of her before he leaves her.

"No wine," he says regretfully, shaking his head. It's a hospital, not a bar, and the best she can hope for is some juice. He's pretty sure there's a vending machine with soda in it somewhere down the hall, but that's no good for her either. "I don't know if the big red cross out the front tipped you off or not, but this is a hospital."

Hawkeye waits for her to sit before he slides into the seat across from her, leaning forward on his elbows to watch her. She looks so much like Aurora it's unsettling. The major difference, he notes, is in the way she looks at him, and that's interesting for several reasons. He's used to the way Aurora looks at him, that hint of a smile, the fondness in her eyes. He's still learning his way around her, too, but he's more likely to find humour or curiosity in her eyes than the woman in front of him. She's looking at him with something approaching derision or impatience, which is so different it amuses him a little.

[intheruins]

"And yet unlike any other hospital I've ever been in," Serena says. She's never been fond of hospitals. She's not sure anyone is. But in the days after the fire when they'd found her wandering and then taken her in, she'd hated all of the white and the sound of the nurse's heels against the floor and how every child seemed to have visitors except her.

"I've spent days in a maternity ward and I don't think I've seen a single father smoking a cigar," she muses, as much to herself as to the doctor. She's been told that it's against the rules, that there's a ban on smoking which is something that makes little sense to her. In her time, everyone smoked. Young, old, rich, poor. Some were so impoverished that tobacco was the only thing that eased the hungry gnaw.

"So what do you recommend I eat, then, doctor?"

[cpthawk]

Technology has changed since Hawkeye was last in a proper hospital. They're a whole lot more impressive than they were, bigger, too. But the general idea is the same. A MASH had been something entirely different to get used to, though. Different kinds of people, different equipment, different patients. Certainly different sicknesses, different wounds to treat.

But a hospital is still a hospital, and maybe most people don't like them, but Hawkeye feels at home here, as much as he had in Boston.

He'd been unsure at first if this is what he should be doing, getting straight back on the horse after Korea, so to speak. He'd thought maybe he needed to get away from the blood for a while, but it turned out to be the opposite. This is where he's supposed to be.

"The jello here is to die for," he says, giving her a wry smile. It's probably crappy, but she's got to eat something. Eating jello as an adult doesn't really seem respectable at any other time though, so he's of the opinion that she should live it up while she can.

[intheruins]

"An unfortunate choice of words," Serena says, although she has no doubt that from him it's intentional. Part of her wonders how such a jokester could become a doctor but, then again, who could survive without a little levity?

She'd heard or read somewhere before that in times of trouble, one could either laugh or cry. Somehow, she'd managed with neither.

"I'll settle for any flavor but green. Seems that's the only one they serve on my ward."

[cpthawk]

She doesn't laugh at that joke either, and Hawkeye is just about ready to give up. Not even a smile or a snigger, that's what he's working with here. He'd take it personally, only he knows it can't possibly be his fault. There have been times before in post op where he's wondered if he should try and take a different approach, but it's like cutting against the grain.

For better or worse, this is who he is and he's still a damn fine doctor even so. Maybe because of. Jury's still out on that one.

Hawkeye frowns, knowing for a fact that this hospital has some kind of fixation on green jello. It's all she's going to find, which is understandably frustrating. Green is just about his least favourite colour, too, though he guesses their reasoning is different.

"It's like St Patrick's Day all year 'round in this place," he tells her, shaking his head. "Close your eyes and it'll all taste about the same, anyway."

[intheruins]

Serena would sigh but there are times that she's gone without eating altogether, there's no point getting caught up in the absence of any real food. She's not even producing milk, the only person she has to take care of is herself and without any other motivation, well.

"Green it is, then," she says. She'll probably need the sugar to make her way back to her room. She used to walk and ride everywhere for hours a day, she's not at all fond of everything suddenly taking more strength than she possesses.

"You know, you never introduced yourself. You could just some strange man who happens to be wearing a white coat," she points out, and with that she manages the slightest smile.

[cpthawk]

"Wait here," he tells her, then gets up from the table. Leaving her for the moment, he manages to rummage up a simple sandwich and a cup of jello, green though it is. He spends a brief moment trying to chat up a nurse into getting him another flavour, but as suspected, there's nothing else on hand. He's beginning to think it's some kind of cosmic joke, some last slap in the face from the war, but he shakes it off.

When he finds her again, he deposits his findings on the table in front of her, gesturing for her to eat. She needs to get her strength up, that much is obvious. He's not about to leave her in peace until he can be sure she can make it back to her room again without collapsing in the hall.

"Dr Pierce," he tells her when he sits down again, leaning back in the chair. The white coat is a pretty good giveaway, but he supposes she has a point. "My friends call me Hawkeye."

[intheruins]

Serena's not about to go anywhere. She's not sure she could if she tried. She needs food and then probably an escort back to her room, though that's something she's not ready to admit aloud.

She can't figure out when or how she went from a miraculous woman who tamed eagles to a helpless single mother, relying on the kindness of strange doctors with stranger senses of humor.

"Thank you," she says, starting on the sandwich. It's cold and bland but it's better than nothing. "I'm Serena."

[cpthawk]

She doesn't look particularly enthusiastic about the food, but that's to be expected. He snags his own cup of jello, rips open the top and plunges the little plastic spoon in to take a bite. It's green and it shouldn't taste green really, but it does. Next week, he'll make it his mission to try and get some other flavours in here, no matter what it takes.

He watches her eat for a moment, makes sure she's eating properly and not just making some show of it. The hospital is a whole lot different than the 4077th had been, but some things are always the same. He still watches over his own patients like a hawk, if the pun will be forgiven, even when there's teams of doctors to assist, now. Serena's not his patient, but he still intends to make sure she's fine before he leaves.

He tells himself it's because he's a doctor and it's his job, but there is something to be said about the fact that she has Aurora's face, maybe.

"What's the baby's name?" he asks, giving her a warm smile. She's a little standoffish, but in his experience there's no quicker way to put a smile on the face of a mother than to talk about her child.

[intheruins]

"George," Serena says, and there is more than a ghost of a smile on her face as she says so. Even before she'd arrived here, even when she was back with Pemberton, she'd known her child would be a boy and that she'd want to name him after his father.

The first. The heir. It was only fitting. "After his father."

She's also given him her maiden name as his middle, but she doesn't talk about that so readily. She'd told the nurses it was her maiden name and they'd nodded and said that was common. She hadn't told him that it was the last shot of the Shaws living on, that the rest of them had perished more than a decade ago.

Nor that she still blames herself.